Six Seconds and the End of the World
by marianne in chains
Summary: And cross off all the ways I failed you, 'cause I failed you.


Note: In a lot of ways, I'm ashamed of this, and in a lot of ways I'm not. There is some temporal wonkiness here, so that explains the tenses, but I like it like that. ;)

"You were my brother, Anakin,"

-

The house Obi-Wan will find, long deserted, in the desert of Tatooine will be small and lonely. Qui-Gon's glowing blue form capable only of breathing so much vitality into the worn stones.

The prophecy may have been misinterpreted, he will tell Obi-Wan one afternoon, as they wait out the midday heat. Obi-Wan will say nothing in return.

It is possible that Anakin was meant to turn to the dark side of the Force, Qui-Gon will continue.

"And I was meant to let you, let both of you down?" Obi-Wan will mutter, mouth turned downward with the bitter strain of self-indulgence that has always been his vice.

Maybe, Qui-Gon will say, reaching out for once to his old padawan, realizing that this, this is more than adolescent anger, maybe it is we who failed you. Today he will let Obi-Wan grieve as a man. Tomorrow he will remind him what it is to be a Jedi.

-

Most Jedi Knights took a padawan, it was true, but most also spent a few years alone, taking missions children could not be sent on. (Of course, padawans weren't children, but they were young, and even the Jedi knew that some things were not meant for youth.) Anakin's apprenticing to Obi-Wan was unprecedented, then, in many ways, but the Council brushed Yoda's concerns away. The boy was the Chosen One, to not train him would be a cruel joke, and Obi-Wan's path never had run straight.

-

The first few years were supposed to be the easiest; Anakin never received the basic Force training given to all Younglings, so there were other teachers, Masters, to teach him most of what he needed to learn. Obi-Wan was tasked with showing Anakin the living Force. After a few more test like the ones the Council gave Anakin, which served only to further demonstrate the boy's amazing abilities, they started more practical lessons. Obi-Wan began with meditation; he, too, was somewhat mentally undisciplined as a youth, and this had always helped him find his center.

Anakin was spectacularly bad at it.

"You must clear your mind, Anakin."

"I'm trying," Anakin sniped, but let out a monstrous sigh and ceases his little, fidgeting movements. The room quieted, and Obi-Wan allowed himself to slip back into a meditative state. His breathing slowed, he could feel the Force flow and ebb through him, He could feel himself growing lighter, losing connection with the floor, and the power of the Force around him grew and—

Obi-Wan opened his eyes to find that he was floating three and a half feet off of the ground. Anakin's eyes were screwed shut in concentration, and he, too, was hovering. "Anakin!" Obi-Wan snapped, and the boy's eyes flew open, and they both dropped to the ground. Obi-Wan managed to catch himself and land with a semblance of grace, but Anakin collapsed in a sad little heap.

"I tried, Master, I really did," he whined. "I could feel the Force flowing through me, like you said."

"That's good, Anakin, but you aren't supposed to harness the Force after that," Obi-Wan reprimanded.

"But I wasn't!" Anakin protested, and Obi-Wan realized he might be in over his head.

-

At first, the importance of what is happening there, on Mustafar, doesn't strike him. It feels and moves too much like a teaching duel, Anakin mirroring his every move, except for those that Obi-Wan takes from him. They've been sparring together almost since Anakin came to the temple, and they can read each other so easily that the elements of trickery and surprise are nearly useless.

In the control room, as Anakin's palm presses Force energy into his, a give and take that yields no net result, Obi-Wan is struck, again, for the thousandth time, by Anakin's immense power. But Anakin still doesn't understand it yet, still sort of roughly shoves at Obi-wan, when, if he would just think and curl his fingers and control himself, Obi-Wan would already be sprawled on the floor. Instead they continue the fight, clambering over mining equipment and old droids, so much like the lessons Obi-Wan gave Anakin years ago in using surrounding terrain. The whole laughable scenario reaches its climax when the lava surges towards them and they both run, the fight momentarily abandoned, as Anakin follows Obi-Wan's trail back to safety.

Something in Obi-Wan's chest clenches, and it's not from exhaustion.

And when they take their fight to the river of fire, Obi-Wan can see in Anakin's eyes the mistake he is about to make, can't help but point it out, still trying to teach the boy. Still trying to make things right.

Anakin never was a good listener.

-

Don't jump, he prays, don't jump, don't land, somehow be better than I know you to be because there is a code and I have followed it for all my life and this code, this code says—

strike.

-

Over the years Obi-Wan will be able to come to peace with Anakin and what he did, even if he does have to separate him from Vader, make them two distinct entities when he knows, as Qui-Gon does, that Vader is only Anakin's darker side. And then Luke will find him, and Obi-Wan will be insanely grateful for his lifetime of Jedi training that allows him to mask his feelings. Luke will be very much so his father's son, eager to escape the poor life that comes with existence on Tatooine, possessed of a directionless anger and a desire to see and do greater things. However, Obi-Wan will be happy to see, his passions are not on the same scale as Anakin's, whose loves and fears destroyed millions and held a galaxy captive. The Force, too, will be very strong with him, but does not pulse and fill his being the way it did with Anakin. This, boy, Obi-Wan will know, is his second chance. He will train Luke properly, make a Jedi of the son if he could not make one of the father.

-

Loss is integral to the Jedi way of life; children are ripped from their homes to pursue it, all the Masters had lost friends and teachers in battle, some had even seen their padawans cut down, so Luke must learn loss in the deepest sense. Already raised as an orphan, then forced from his planet by the smoking corpses of the only family he had, it will not be enough. Besides, Luke will only have been only been a Jedi for a few weeks, at most, and so he has yet to experience loss from that perspective.

There will be no selfishness on Obi-Wan's part in this. Maybe a decade or more ago there would have been, an angry act committed by a bitter and lonely man, but not now. Now, as he will lower his weapon there will remain nothing but calm and, somewhere deep below, a sense of sorrow.

I took even this from you, he will think towards the end, how great you could have been, with a body still of flesh. And the hiss of the saber on his skin will be the only consolation he will know.

-

Of course he will keep a close eye on the proceedings, and when Anakin redeems himself, fulfills the prophecy, as Yoda will remark, the twenty year ache in his chest will begin to dissipate, and make way for a flood of irrepressible joy as before him there will be the boy, the young man, to whom he parted his lips and spoke,

-

"I loved you."


End file.
